


through the ashen greyness (wild sparkles dimly burn)

by lunarctus (nex_et_nox)



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Gen, can be read as gen or preslash r27
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-03-25
Packaged: 2019-12-07 03:51:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18229514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nex_et_nox/pseuds/lunarctus
Summary: The mafia, the Triads, the yakuza – they are like everyone else. Until they meet their Match, the world is as monochrome as it is for any civilian. They cannot see the green of leaves, the blue of the sea, the red of blood.But theycansee Flames.(Reborn will probably die before he gets the chance to see the world in color.)





	through the ashen greyness (wild sparkles dimly burn)

**Author's Note:**

> aj-tzi-bal said: Prompt #2 - "the one where you only see color once you meet your soulmate." with R27, pretty fcking p l e a se
> 
> five fucking months later I deliver

No one can see color until they meet their Match’s eyes. Two souls together can see what one soul alone cannot. Or maybe, as some have theorized, what people see is a reflection of their Match’s soul – eyes are windows and mirrors both, bouncing color back to that Matched soul.

It has to be in person, everyone agrees. Portraits, photos, and videos don’t work, though it’s only within the last century that that has been conclusively, scientifically proven. Colors dim if one part of a Match is in a coma; they disappear completely if a Match dies. No one needs to prove that.

Matches can be platonic or romantic, shared between brothers, lovers, or friends. Often, but not always, twins are Matched. There are rare cases of three or even four people being Matched, sometimes siblings, sometimes not. What it all comes down to is that a Match is the perfect complement to your soul; no person is incomplete without a Match, but life is _better_ with a Match. Life is colorful with your Match.

The mafia, the Triads, the yakuza – they are like everyone else. Until they meet their Match, the world is as monochrome as it is for any civilian. They cannot see the green of leaves, the blue of the sea, the red of blood.

But they _can_ see Flames.

* * *

Reborn is very, _very_ good at his job. He’s the world’s greatest hitman. It doesn’t matter that he can’t see color.

Well. That he can’t see what colors most of the world.

He sees the blazing yellow of his Chaos shot, the sparks that flicker around his fingers, the faint sheen nearly absorbed by his dark eyes if he catches himself in a reflection.

He sees the burning, _damning_ yellow of his Pacifier.

He still can’t see bananas. Daffodils. The sun for which his Flames are named. Only his Flames, or the Flames of other people.

Reborn knows all the colors Flames are, though he was careful to never ask anyone what each color was. The first moment he saw each Flame, he committed it to his memory, covertly listening until he knew what color matched which Flame; he didn’t want anyone to know whether or not he was Matched. He didn’t want to give anyone an advantage over him. He still holds that secret close to his chest.

When – if, a cynical part of him insists – he meets his Match, he’ll be able to recognize the Flame colors immediately. There are sites and books dedicated to identifying colors to people who have lived monochrome lives, but Reborn will never need the colors of the rainbow identified to him.

Bits of soul peek out constantly in the mafia. Bits of color that Reborn can see. Bits of color that bounce against every Arcobaleno’s chest, evidence of their souls swirling away slowly to hold the world together.

Reborn will probably die before he gets the chance to see the world in color. On his better days, he tells himself it doesn’t matter.

On his worst—

That doesn’t really matter either.

* * *

“So this is orange?” Dino asks, staring at the ring on his hand and the Flames wreathing it.

Reborn sighs. “Yes. You idiot.”

“Hey!” Dino squawks. “I was just asking! I haven’t…you know. Met my Match yet.” He looks rather upset by this.

Reborn doesn’t particularly care. He cocks his gun. “Do we need to go over Flame color theory again?”

“No!” Dino says. “No, that’s okay! Red is Storm, orange is Sky, yellow is Sun—” He looks at the glowing point of Reborn’s gun and audibly gulps.

Reborn supposes he should be a little lenient. Not every family uses their Flames as often and as openly as Vongola does, in part because material that conducts Flames is relatively rare. On the other hand, Dino should know this already; he’s been reared as the heir since his birth, and he went to mafia school. Young idiots don’t keep perfect hold of their Flames when they’re all tossed in together, and sometimes emotions boil over.

After all, not everyone _needs_ Flame-conductive material, and strong emotions are known to summon Flames anyway. Before the curse, Reborn used to summon his Flames just because he could, working with them, weaving them through his fingers, building his stamina.

(Watching the flickers of soul-fire that were the only color he could see.)

“Green is…?” Reborn asks leadingly. The yellow glow at the tip of his gun

(his green gun, apparently Leon is always green, because he changes his shape but never his color – Luce told him this, Luce who betrayed them, Luce who’d met her Match and knew without asking that Reborn hadn’t met his)

grows brighter.

“Lightning! Blue is Rain, indigo is Mist, violet is Cloud,” Dino says, rushing to get it out.

“Good,” Reborn says, letting his Flames die away. Leon regains his chameleon form and walks up Reborn’s arm to jump from his shoulder up onto his hat.

* * *

_You’re a Sun!_ a man now only alive in memory said.

Reborn leveled his gun between the man’s eyes. The tip glowed bright with a color he didn’t have a name for. Yet.

_What color is this?_ he’d asked.

_Y-yellow,_ the man said. _Please, don’t—_

Reborn shot him. _Yellow_ wreathed his bullet.

_Interesting_ , Reborn said.

* * *

“Hey, Reborn?” Dino asks him some time later. “Have you…do you see in color?”

Reborn meets Dino’s eyes. During training, there is sometimes a spark of color shading the light grey his eyes usually present as, an orange film that Reborn can see because it is one of the _only_ colors he can see. He doesn’t know what color Dino’s eyes truly are. He doesn’t know if they’re even a color he knows.

Black, white, grey. The Rainbow. Those are the only colors he knows, and he’s only certain of the latter.

“What do you think?” he responds coolly.

Wisely, Dino doesn’t ask again.

* * *

Not many think to ask. If pressed, they would probably say yes. Reborn? Yeah, he must be able to see color; maybe that’s part of why he’s the world’s greatest hitman, you know? After all, if you see in color, some Mafiosi say, then you have an advantage. You catch what other people would miss.

Reborn sneers at that, but he doesn’t bother to correct them. He doesn’t need color to do his job. _Idiots_. He’s just that good.

(He doesn’t need colors to do his job, but that doesn’t stop him from wanting them. In a way, being in the mafia, being Flame Active, is like being Tantalus.

He’s always so close, but the colors never stay. They fade away, out of his grasp, back to somewhere he can’t reach.)

* * *

_If colors are why Reborn is so good, maybe we should take them away_ , someone whispers.

_Are you crazy? Can you imagine how dangerous Reborn’s Match must be?_ someone hisses back.

_Can you imagine what Reborn would do if we touched his Match?_

No one brings it up again. Reborn makes a note of names and faces anyway. Some of the whisperers have Matches; he sends each Match small bouquets of tansies and tarragon and black-eyed Susans.

Conveniently, all the flowers he needs for the message are, he’s been assured, yellow.

He almost doesn’t need to sign the card. He does anyway, of course. Just to make sure the message gets through their thick skulls.

_Nobody_ threatens Reborn. He won’t let them threaten his unfound Match either.

* * *

Reborn doesn’t trust Iemitsu’s report – the man is an idiot. He’ll do his own surveillance.

The first thing he does is break into the school and make copies of Tsunayoshi’s records. He also breaks into the hospital, this time pulling information on both Tsunayoshi and Nana. He plants bugs around town and the school, listening in on conversations about the Sawadas.

Tsunayoshi seems to be another Dino. He’s nearly as clumsy. He almost never lifts his head, which might play some part in it. Reborn is going to beat good posture into that child. He did it with Dino.

He compares his surveillance with Iemitsu’s report. Iemitsu’s is still lacking. He sets it on fire and makes a mental note to yell at Iemitsu later, or at least ask Lal to do it for him.

Reborn slips a flyer into the mailbox and waits.

* * *

“Tsu-kun!” Nana calls up the stairs. “Come meet your new tutor!”

Tsunayoshi comes tripping down the stairs. “Mom, I told you, I don’t need a—”

Their eyes meet.

_I don’t know that color,_ is Reborn’s first stunned thought. _I don’t know what color his eyes are._

They aren’t the color of any Flame. They aren’t black or white or grey. They are – _something._ They are a new color, and his hair is a new color, and the whole world around him is suddenly bursting in _color._

Reborn has found his Match.

**Author's Note:**

> tansy = I declare war on you, tarragon = lasting interest, black-eyed Susan = justice, because what's classier than delivering threatening bouquets to your enemies' loved ones?
> 
> might continue this later, but for the record Mukuro and Chrome are Matches and bc Flames are basically your souls anyway, Chrome wakes up in the hospital after talking with Mukuro and she can see in color.


End file.
